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Saudi heir's death fails to curb women at wheel

Ruth Pollard

AMMAN: As Saudi Arabia mourned the death of another heir to the throne, a small group of women in the capital Riyadh were preparing to do what the late Crown Prince Nayef bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud vowed never to allow - drive.

The 78-year-old is the second crown prince to die in eight months - his predecessor and brother Sultan bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, died in October - and all eyes are on the increasingly frail 88-year-old King Abdullah as he prepares to choose Prince Nayef's successor.

The appointment in November of Prince Nayef, a hardline conservative, raised fears that if he did become leader he would abolish King Abdullah's cautious attempts at reform, such as promising that women would be allowed to stand and vote in the 2015 council.

He was a vociferous supporter of Saudi Arabia's decision to send troops to neighbouring Bahrain last year to support the island's Sunni Muslim monarchy's violent response to the peaceful protests staged by its Shiite majority.

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Prince Nayef also led the crackdown against the Islamists who seized control of the Grand Mosque in Mecca in 1979 and also oversaw the crushing of Saudi-based al-Qaeda terrorist cells in the mid-2000s.

Leaders of the reform movement have reportedly been arrested and jailed on his orders, and rather than enter into talks with opposition figures he once famously said: ''What we won by the sword, we will keep by the sword.''

The man experts say is most likely to replace Prince Nayef, the Defence Minister, Prince Salman bin Abdulaziz, is seen as a moderate on social issues such as women's rights, but a hawk when it comes to regional issues.

''Since he became defence minister last year … he has aggressively pushed the Saudi military to be ready for conflict with Iran if necessary, and has pushed Yemen to take on al-Qaeda. There is no sign he disagrees with the occupation of Bahrain,'' Bruce Riedel, a senior fellow in the Saban Centre at the Brookings Institution, wrote on the Daily Beast.

''But Salman also has a reputation … for accepting and working with peaceful change in the kingdom … and [he] is likely to continue Abdullah's modest reforms without undermining them.''

Prince Salman, who until last year was governor of Riyadh for more than 40 years, oversaw the development of the capital from a small desert city to a diplomatic hub, pushing the advance of technology and science and massive infrastructure programs.

As the revolutions sweep through the Arab world, the kingdom - a close ally of the US - is facing unprecedented and growing demands for reform.

The push by women to be allowed to drive (and to work, travel and open a bank account without the permission of a close male relative) is part of that process, but there is also unrest in the minority Shiite community and concern about rising rates of unemployment among those under 30, who make up two-thirds of the population.

The royal family has spent billions in the past year on programs aimed at quelling this dissent; however, the issues remain very much alive in the world's largest oil-producing country.

One of the organisers of the women's driving protests, 33-year-old Manal al-Sharif, last week posted an open letter to King Abdullah, asking that he end the ban on women driving.

Ms Sharif urged women with international driving licences to take to the roads yesterday, the first anniversary of the re-energised campaign for reform.